1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed generally to a clothes hanger having collapsible arms and, more particularly, to a one-piece collapsible clothes hanger movable between a collapsed and an open position by a single, one-handed action.
2. Description of the Related Art
Clothes hangers are well known and perform the function of suspending an article of clothing from a closet rod or the like in a generally satisfactory manner. When used to hang up turtleneck sweaters or pull-over style garments, however, the fixed shape of known hangers require that one either feed the hanger through the bottom of the garment --an awkward procedure-- or risk damaging the neck opening of the garment by forcing the larger hanger through it. Removing known hangers from such a garment is accomplished by reversing these steps.
In the case of buttonable garments, the top few buttons often need to be buttoned or unbuttoned in order to place known hangers in, or remove them from, such garments. Also, conventional hangers are of a size which can make storing them a problem, particularly in places such as a clothing store where space is always at a premium. Furthermore, it would be beneficial to the traveler, for example, to provide a hanger which fits readily into a small space, such as luggage pockets, purses, glove compartments and the like.
Finally, it has been well documented in recent studies of injury in the workplace that a sufficient number of certain motions can --over time-- lead to debilitating injury. Simplifying the act of hanging clothes would therefore seem likely to reduce the incidence of such injuries throughout the clothing industry.
Collapsible hangers have been proposed in which the hanger arms are movable between a ready-to-use, open position and a closed, or collapsed position. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,673,115 discloses a unitary collapsible coat hanger of molded polypropylene having right and left hanger arms attached to a hanger body by hinge straps. Locking arms are connected to the undersides of the hanger arms below the hanger body, and a "c"-shaped spring joins the ends of the locking arms to one another. Opening and closing of the hanger requires a two handed operation since the c-shaped spring must be manipulated with one hand while the other holds the hanger. This leaves no hands free for holding the garment. Furthermore, while it may be possible to insert this hanger through a neck opening, one hand must be inserted upward through the garment to move the c-shaped spring during both the opening and collapsing operations.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,227,632 is disclosed a flexible garment hanger having two hanger arms connected by a locking bar below the body of the hanger and including a stop member projecting from the locking bar. The hanger is opened and closed by moving this stop member upwardly into an over-center locking position in abutment with the hanger body and, respectively, by pulling down on the stop member. Again, two hands are required for operation of the hanger and one hand must be inserted into the garment for both the opening and collapsing operations.
West German published application No. 1 429 922 discloses a collapsible coat hanger having arms pivoted on a spindle and interacting with finger grips. Pulling of the finger grips upwardly relative to the hanger causes the hanger arms to open. The hanger disclosed in this German patent document has numerous component parts which would add assembly costs to the final unit price.